The First Album - Song by Song

[Charger]

Sleeping Village is without a doubt one of the more oddball songs in Sabbath's catalogue but I absolutely love it. The slow intro, the haunting vocals from Ozzy, the whole atmosphere is stellar.

And then when it speeds up into a hard rocky jazz-jam it just gets better and better.

Sleeping Village is something of Sabbath's Lazy...an instrumental with lyrics.

[Typhon]

Well said, Charger.   Even better said, Jack. 

@KDC:  It's a journey, buddy.  Just let the Sabs take you where they wish.   

[KiloDeltaCharlie]

I'm going to move on to Warning... and then hide somewhere safe!


This is a track of two parts. There's the song part and there's the extending guitar solo... I absolutely love the song part, musically and lyrically it's absolutely perfect...

... however, I've never really liked the guitar solo and these days I just skip it.

[Charger]

The guitar solo part is what makes that song so awesome...the track itself (being a cover and all, although bit more fitting for Sabbath than Evil Woman was) isn't anything spectacular but once Tony gets soloing the song just elevates to another level!

That song all in all was so early 70s that you can't really get much more early 70s than that. And that's all positive too I might add. The extended jam section, played live in the studio...it has it all.

I remember reading that the original version of the Warning clocked in at over 15 or was it nearly 20 minutes long..I'd love to hear that!

[Jack the Stripper]

Another eerie song that perfectly fits the mood of the album. Great cover which Sabbath made their own with the long extended jam and Tony’s stand alone solo. Love the lyrics but why oh why did Ozzy change the line “I was warned about you baby” to “I was born without you baby”? Once I realised this I couldn’t unrealise it, the former makes much more sense.

[Zzzptm]

Another eerie song that perfectly fits the mood of the album. Great cover which Sabbath made their own with the long extended jam and Tony’s stand alone solo. Love the lyrics but why oh why did Ozzy change the line “I was warned about you baby” to “I was born without you baby”? Once I realised this I couldn’t unrealise it, the former makes much more sense.

Yeah, that's the hazard of doing it all in one take...

[Zzzptm]

Gonna compare and contrast:

I do prefer the Black Sabbath version for one reason: it doesn't have the big pauses that the ADR version has. I like the smoother flow in the BS version. That being said, I do enjoy both. Worthy of note is how the bass is turned way up on both. Listening to just about anything Jack Bruce played bass on, same thing.

So this gets me to ask, what was the secret sauce in Black Sabbath that made it the band that people all point back at and not Cream? Because both ADR and BS were compared to Cream, along with Zeppelin and Deep Purple. They and a bunch of other bands were all a bunch of kids playing blues at a loud volume with drummers playing Buddy Rich fills in between 4/4 beats.

The band definitely worked well together - no question of that at all, especially on the first 6 albums. But so do a bunch of other bands. Geezer and Bill were a great rhythm section, but so were Overend Watts and Buffin in Mott the Hoople. Ozzy's vocals are distinct, but so were those of a lot of other vocalists. If Rod Stewart had been singing vocals, we'd be all about Rod v Dio and stuff.

I think it comes back to Iommi's guitar style, when all is said and done. His guitar sound is what made the band.

[KiloDeltaCharlie]

And now for the gratuitous and unnecessary ranking of the songs:

1. N.I.B.
2. Behind the Wall of Sleep
3= Black Sabbath
3= The Wizard
5. Warning
6. Wicked World
7. A Bit of Finger
8. Evil Woman

[Charger]

I'll play.

1. Wicked World
2. N.I.B. (Especially the live version with Ronnie! Up yours haters! )
3. The Wizard
4. Black Sabbath
5. The Warning
6. Sleeping Village
7. Behind The Wall Of Sleep

And on another day the order of any of those songs could be totally different.

This would be the only constant:

8. Evil Woman

[Zzzptm]

Overall, the album remains my least-liked of the first six. I like it more than I used to, but I still like the others more. The rawness works on NIB and The Wizard and Black Sabbath. It detracts on side two, where the songs could have been tightened up more. If "The Warning" left out the massive solo and the solo itself were a separate instrumental, I would have been able to get into it all much better.

My fave track is and has been The Wizard.

Next up is Wicked World (Featuring the Tony Iommi Jazz Trio)

Warning is too similar to Wicked World, so I'm going to put it fourth, after the third-place tie with Black Sabbath and NIB.

The rest is stuff that kinda blends into the other tracks on the LP.

[Typhon]

Inserting my final rating of the albums for completion's sake.

Black Sabbath - 10/10

[Charger]

I'll rate these too then now...

Black Sabbath:

* * * * ½

Evil Woman cost that half a star.

[Typhon]

I'll rate these too then now...

You mean for completion's sake?   

Black Sabbath:

* * * * ½

Evil Woman cost that half a star.

There is no Evil Woman on mine.

[Charger]

I'll rate these too then now...

You mean for completion's sake?   

Indeed!

Black Sabbath:

* * * * ½

Evil Woman cost that half a star.

There is no Evil Woman on mine.

Well then I understand why you gave it a full rating!

Yeah Evil Woman being a cover of a US band ofcourse was not included on the US version...

[BOGBLAST]

Groundbreaking album. First heard this at age 10. Needless to say I was hooked. I think MY favorite song is Warning. What I like best is the part just before Tony's stand alone solo. You've got the guitar on one side and the bass on the other. As a kid I used to turn the balance to the bass side and groove on Geezer's bass.